Stephanie
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- Jul 11, 2004
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ran across this. it's an older article but I found it interesting. What do you think?
SNIP:
January 1, 2015
Patrick Garry, RenewAmerica analyst
Job creation at every level. The ability of every parent to choose the school his or her child attends. A greater mobility for those at the bottom rungs of the economic ladder. A reformed and more affordable higher education system. Targeted tax relief for low-income workers and parents. Greater access to job-skill education programs.
Conservatives generally advocate all these policies, and yet they continue to be charged with doing nothing to address the plight of the struggling members of society. Liberals charge conservatives with caring only about the rich, even though Democrats represent the wealthiest districts in America. Liberals charge conservatives with being allies of the rich against the poor, even though during the Obama presidency, the rich have prospered like never before and the poor and middle class have either stagnated or fared badly.
Despite these accusations, it is not just the Left that is to blame for the perpetuation of this image of conservatism as unconcerned about the poor. Conservatives must also shoulder some of the responsibility for not aggressively enough promoting their anti-poverty agenda, and for conceding this policy issue to liberals for far too long.
To reverse this image, conservatives must not only assert their poverty proposals, they must make the goal of improving the lives of vulnerable people a central focus of their entire policy agenda. But this central focus does not involve a change in conservative principles or policies, since economic mobility and advancement lie at the core of the conservative philosophy. What it does mean is that conservatives must measure all policies by their effect on the vulnerable. For instance, if certain income tax cuts won't likely help the vulnerable, since nearly half of all Americans have no net federal income tax liability, then perhaps such cuts are not a central issue that should define or preoccupy conservatives.
Conservatives have a great starting place in their campaign against poverty. A free market economy has lifted hundreds of millions of people out of poverty, both here and abroad. Even those who are poor have a much better standard of living due to economic progress. In inflation-adjusted dollars, groceries today cost 13 times less than 150 years ago. The typical person living below the poverty line not only has electricity and running water – something he didn't have sixty years ago – but also has microwaves, personal computers, air conditioning, and cable television. Three quarters of the poor own a car, and roughly a third have two or more cars. By 2011, the average per capita housing space for people in poverty was higher than the average housing space for all Americans in 1980.
This improvement in the living conditions of the poor does not mean that the plight of the vulnerable should be dismissed or ignored; it just means that the answer to the problem of poverty may well reside in something that has worked – economic progress – rather than in certain government policies that haven't worked.
But a criticism of liberal failures is no substitute for corrective action. In fact, conservatives' hesitancy to articulate a positive anti-poverty agenda only feeds the liberal claim that they don't care about the less fortunate. This is how President Obama, whose administration has been terrible for the poor, has been able to assail his political opponents as being indifferent to the poor and struggling.
If conservatives wish to broaden their appeal, they need to articulate policies that appeal across all demographic lines – and one political stand with universal appeal is concern for the poor and those who might fall into poverty.
A report card on the liberal anti-poverty program
This year marked the 50th anniversary of Lyndon Johnson's "War on Poverty," which has been the centerpiece of liberal anti-poverty policies for the past half-century. In boasting of these policies, liberals often talk about the public funds that have been spent. And there's no question that money has been spent. Since its beginning, the government has committed $22 trillion (measured in 2012 dollars) to Johnson's War on Poverty. After adjustments for inflation, this represents about three times more than what was spent on all military wars since the American Revolution. Inflation-adjusted government transfers for social welfare programs soared more than tenfold between 1964 and 2013. And yet, despite all this spending, the present poverty rate is about the same as it was in 1967. The poverty rate is the highest in a generation, and deep poverty is near record highs.
The federal government currently runs more than 80 means-tested welfare programs at an annual cost of more than $940 billion. (This does not include Social Security, Medicare or Unemployment Insurance.) However, if we divide the nearly $1 trillion spent by the federal government on these anti-poverty program by the 46 million people in poverty, the government could simply distribute a cash payment to everyone in an amount exceeding $20,000, or nearly $82,000 for a family of four. That's almost four times the $23,850 federal poverty line for that family, and would immediately lift everyone out of poverty. Although this would not be a practical (or long-term productive) strategy, it does illustrate the ineffectiveness of the current federal programs.
The proportion of the population below the poverty line was dropping rapidly in the years immediately before the War on Poverty was fully underway. In the seven years between 1959 and 1966, according to the Census Bureau, the percentage of people living in poverty dropped by about a third, from 22.4 to 14.7 percent. Since then, however, the official poverty rate has been essentially stuck. In 2012, the national poverty rate was 15 percent – slightly higher than it was in 1966. But within this overall number, for instance, the poverty rates for children under 18 and for working-age people between the ages of 18 and 64 are all higher than in 1966.
ALL of it here:
The right deal the conservative anti-poverty approach
SNIP:
January 1, 2015
Patrick Garry, RenewAmerica analyst
Conservatives generally advocate all these policies, and yet they continue to be charged with doing nothing to address the plight of the struggling members of society. Liberals charge conservatives with caring only about the rich, even though Democrats represent the wealthiest districts in America. Liberals charge conservatives with being allies of the rich against the poor, even though during the Obama presidency, the rich have prospered like never before and the poor and middle class have either stagnated or fared badly.
Despite these accusations, it is not just the Left that is to blame for the perpetuation of this image of conservatism as unconcerned about the poor. Conservatives must also shoulder some of the responsibility for not aggressively enough promoting their anti-poverty agenda, and for conceding this policy issue to liberals for far too long.
To reverse this image, conservatives must not only assert their poverty proposals, they must make the goal of improving the lives of vulnerable people a central focus of their entire policy agenda. But this central focus does not involve a change in conservative principles or policies, since economic mobility and advancement lie at the core of the conservative philosophy. What it does mean is that conservatives must measure all policies by their effect on the vulnerable. For instance, if certain income tax cuts won't likely help the vulnerable, since nearly half of all Americans have no net federal income tax liability, then perhaps such cuts are not a central issue that should define or preoccupy conservatives.
Conservatives have a great starting place in their campaign against poverty. A free market economy has lifted hundreds of millions of people out of poverty, both here and abroad. Even those who are poor have a much better standard of living due to economic progress. In inflation-adjusted dollars, groceries today cost 13 times less than 150 years ago. The typical person living below the poverty line not only has electricity and running water – something he didn't have sixty years ago – but also has microwaves, personal computers, air conditioning, and cable television. Three quarters of the poor own a car, and roughly a third have two or more cars. By 2011, the average per capita housing space for people in poverty was higher than the average housing space for all Americans in 1980.
This improvement in the living conditions of the poor does not mean that the plight of the vulnerable should be dismissed or ignored; it just means that the answer to the problem of poverty may well reside in something that has worked – economic progress – rather than in certain government policies that haven't worked.
But a criticism of liberal failures is no substitute for corrective action. In fact, conservatives' hesitancy to articulate a positive anti-poverty agenda only feeds the liberal claim that they don't care about the less fortunate. This is how President Obama, whose administration has been terrible for the poor, has been able to assail his political opponents as being indifferent to the poor and struggling.
If conservatives wish to broaden their appeal, they need to articulate policies that appeal across all demographic lines – and one political stand with universal appeal is concern for the poor and those who might fall into poverty.
This year marked the 50th anniversary of Lyndon Johnson's "War on Poverty," which has been the centerpiece of liberal anti-poverty policies for the past half-century. In boasting of these policies, liberals often talk about the public funds that have been spent. And there's no question that money has been spent. Since its beginning, the government has committed $22 trillion (measured in 2012 dollars) to Johnson's War on Poverty. After adjustments for inflation, this represents about three times more than what was spent on all military wars since the American Revolution. Inflation-adjusted government transfers for social welfare programs soared more than tenfold between 1964 and 2013. And yet, despite all this spending, the present poverty rate is about the same as it was in 1967. The poverty rate is the highest in a generation, and deep poverty is near record highs.
The federal government currently runs more than 80 means-tested welfare programs at an annual cost of more than $940 billion. (This does not include Social Security, Medicare or Unemployment Insurance.) However, if we divide the nearly $1 trillion spent by the federal government on these anti-poverty program by the 46 million people in poverty, the government could simply distribute a cash payment to everyone in an amount exceeding $20,000, or nearly $82,000 for a family of four. That's almost four times the $23,850 federal poverty line for that family, and would immediately lift everyone out of poverty. Although this would not be a practical (or long-term productive) strategy, it does illustrate the ineffectiveness of the current federal programs.
The proportion of the population below the poverty line was dropping rapidly in the years immediately before the War on Poverty was fully underway. In the seven years between 1959 and 1966, according to the Census Bureau, the percentage of people living in poverty dropped by about a third, from 22.4 to 14.7 percent. Since then, however, the official poverty rate has been essentially stuck. In 2012, the national poverty rate was 15 percent – slightly higher than it was in 1966. But within this overall number, for instance, the poverty rates for children under 18 and for working-age people between the ages of 18 and 64 are all higher than in 1966.
ALL of it here:
The right deal the conservative anti-poverty approach
